


the blood is rare (and sweet as cherry wine)

by Pachamama9



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Abuse, Abusive Relationships, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety, Domestic Violence, Dysfunctional Family, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Manipulation, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Eventual Romance, F/M, Family Dynamics, Friends to Lovers, Good Percy Weasley, Good Weasley Family (Harry Potter), Homophobia, Hurt Percy Weasley, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, Injury, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Major Character Injury, Married Life, Mental Health Issues, Panic Attacks, Parenthood, Past Relationship(s), Percy Weasley Needs a Hug, Percy Weasley has PTSD, Percy Weasley-centric, Percy is a good dad, Physical Abuse, Post-Battle of Hogwarts, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Oliver Wood, Rape/Non-con Elements, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Hatred, Seven Years Later, Slow Burn, Song: Cherry Wine (Hozier), Starting Over, Therapy, Threats of Violence, Verbal Abuse, Violence, Whump, and oliver teaches him, female abuser male victim, lots of hurt but the comfort will come i promise, loving weasleys, percy weasley doesn't know how to be happy, percy weasley whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-19
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:34:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27098938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pachamama9/pseuds/Pachamama9
Summary: Percy Weasley would never admit it, but he is terrified of his wife Audrey. But when she screams at him and hits him and threatens him, he knows he deserves it.orSeven years after the Battle of Hogwarts, Percy is married with two little girls, but he never forgot about the boy he loved at Hogwarts. When Oliver comes back into his life, he slowly teaches him that love shouldn't hurt.
Relationships: Angelina Johnson/George Weasley, Audrey Weasley/Percy Weasley, Fleur Delacour/Bill Weasley, Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley, Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, Percy Weasley & Oliver Wood, Percy Weasley/Oliver Wood
Comments: 21
Kudos: 261





	the blood is rare (and sweet as cherry wine)

**Author's Note:**

> tw: domestic violence, verbal abuse, violence, war, war aftermath, PTSD, panic attacks (let me know if i missed anything)

It’s the wrong day for a party.

Percy has hyperventilated himself into a corner, hands on his head and heart pumping. 

He doesn’t know how long he’s been like this—seconds, minutes, hours? He can’t think, and he can scarcely breathe. Every lungful is a battle. He tries to draw air into his body, but he can’t—

“There you are!”   
  


Percy’s breath sticks in his throat, his chest straining in its search for more oxygen. He hugs himself tightly, trying to break free of his breathless spell, and his throat opens into a thin straw, air barely sneaking through his windpipe. 

“Merlin’s beard—what are you doing on the floor? Get up!”

He can’t. He can’t do it. He can’t—

A hand wraps around his wrist and yanks him to his feet. It’s Audrey, his wife of five years, and he’s still gasping for air. He tried to cave in on himself, but she pushes him up. “This is not the time, Percy—shape up, come on, we’ve got to set up.”

“I know, I know…” He’s nodding his head in agreement, because he knows how important this party is, but right now all he wants to do is to put his head between his knees and curl up in the bathtub. His chest is a game of wizard’s chess. 

Her boa-constrictor hand is still tight around his arm. “Then what the hell are you doing now? We have to get going.”

“I’m—trying,” he chokes out, and she makes an annoyed sound. “Just—a second—I’m trying—”

“This is supposed to be a good day,” she snaps, although her voice, thank Merlin, is starting to soften. “Please, please don’t fuck this up. I don’t want you ruining the party.”

He’s dizzy and breathless (and his head still aches) but he forces himself to a state of purgatory where his mind sinks to its blackened knees. He nods, and she releases his wrist as she pulls him into a hug. He sags into her little as she rubs his back, clinging to her for some semblance of strength. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Audrey kisses his cheek and tells him, “It’s just your nerves, baby. Gotta keep ‘em under control, right?”

“I know,” he says, but it doesn’t stop his heart from racing. He feels almost sick with worry, the feeling churning deep in his belly. “Can you...go check...on the baby?”

She nods and kisses him again, a little softer, and the sweetness of her touch calms him a little. As she exits, Percy braces himself against the bathroom sink and sucks in a breath. There’s nothing to worry about—Lucy, their newborn, is perfectly healthy, and old enough that any germs introduced to her by their family and friends wouldn’t be a true danger to her. She even made little baby sounds this morning, happy cooing sounds as Molly, their four-year-old, wiggled her fingers between the bars of Lucy’s crib. Molly’s taken really well to the new baby, which is just one more good thing for their household.

His hands are shaking and he doesn’t know why. What could be so bad about showing his family his beautiful baby girl? They’re going to love her. There’s already so many children in the Weasley family—baby Rose, little James, and all of Bill’s and George’s children—all of whom will be coming as well to meet their new cousin. What could go wrong? 

  
  


* * *

The oven dings, so Percy takes out his wand, levitates the tray of hors d’oeuvres onto the stovetop, and places each one on a frosted glass dish. He’s spent the last hour making these, but right now he can barely smell them for fear of throwing up. 

Audrey’s back now with the baby, and she huffs at the sight of him—legs wobbly, face pale, hand shaky. “Oh, come on then,” she says. “Get up, Percy. You’ve been through a war—you can handle one little party.”

It’s so stupid, he knows, and he nods. She’s right. Last week, when he expressed his unexplainable worries about the upcoming party, she laughed and said it was funny.  _ The first time you’ve seen your family since Lucy was born,  _ she chuckled,  _ and now you want to cancel? _ Everything sounds so much simpler when Audrey says it. He’s never been the most social of people, so it’s probably his anxiety over an overload of social interactions, but still… He feels as though something will go wrong. 

He sets up the long table with all the food and drinks as Audrey breastfeeds in the other room, but the feeling doesn’t leave him, even as the guests start to arrive. It’s late February, so every time the door opens, cold air and stray snowflakes rush in as waterproof boots kick against door frames and scrape on welcome mats. “Perce!” one shouts with glee, and he takes a break from organizing the table to greet his brother. “Where’s the little bugger?”

Ron’s followed by Harry and a heavily pregnant Ginny using her husband as a prop to get her through the door. Percy rubs the back of his neck. “She’s just eating right now—Audrey’ll be out in a moment.”

“Alright.” Ron hugs him and claps him on the back a couple of times. “It’s good to see you. How much sleep you been getting?”

Taken aback, Percy’s thoughts halt. “Wh-what?”

Ron chuckles. “...with the new baby? ‘Mione and I are barely cracking five hours a night with Rose—she’s a bloody banshee, that one—so how much are you getting? You’ve got two, so…”

Percy gives him a nervous smile. “Yeah… Well, Molly’s never been too much trouble, and we’re both taking some time off work to spend with Lucy, so a good amount?”

His brother’s brow raises. “If you’ve got so much time on your hands, how come we never see you, mate?”

Percy opens his mouth to respond, he doesn’t get much of a chance to say much of anything as the doorbell rings again. 

* * *

Everyone adores little Lucy. While Molly takes after Audrey and her Bengali heritage with her ink-black hair and sepia skin, Lucy resembles Percy. She’s darker than him, and much pinker, but there’s no mistaking that red hair. 

She spits up all over Mum, who simply laughs and takes her into the bathroom to clean her up. Percy, not yet having lost his protectiveness over his fragile baby, follows her as Audrey entertains the rest of their guests. Audrey’s an officer for Magical Law Enforcement, and she’s in the middle of a story about catching a fugitive Death Eater as he leaves with Lucy and Mum. On the other side of the room, Molly watches her cousins Victoire and Dominique sing a song in French completely off-key as Fred claps his little hands happily in his father’s lap.

With fewer than thirty friends and family in attendance, it’s a small party, but Percy’s never been one for parties; especially after enduring the war, Percy’s been particularly avoidant of people. He’s not  _ afraid  _ of them, but he… He was an accomplice to You-Know-Who and his brutality, and that’s not something, even seven years later, that he can forget. He avoids people, mostly, or anyone who could possibly remind him of his role in the War. Audrey’s the only person outside of his family who really accepts him from who he is, and acknowledges that he made a mistake but loves him anyway.

“Alright if I take over, dear?” Mum says, already wiping off Lucy’s sticky chin and bouncing her up and down to make sure she stays calm. They’re in the nursery, and she places the baby on the changing table.

Percy nods tiredly and slumps into Audrey’s rocking chair. “Thanks, Mum.”

He hasn’t seen her since the baby was born, but she looks the same—greyed hair short and wild, colorful sweater thrown on top of a flowery dress that she made herself, crow’s feet deepening her easy smile. She coos at the baby as she goes, cleaning her up and putting her into a fresh onesie. 

“Ron’s right,” she says, and Percy swallows. “We don’t see you enough, dear. You know we can help you with the little ones… Ron and Ginny and George… Even Bill, although he’s got his hands full… They love the help, there’s no shame in asking.”

Percy shrugs. “I know, Mum. Audrey and I just like doing things ourselves.” She frowns at him and hands him baby Lucy, who wiggles in excitement as soon as she gets within range of him. As he takes his daughter, a wave of calm comes over him. Like Molly, she fits perfectly in his arms like there’s a spot carved for her there. She’s warm and she smells like eucalyptus soap; he kisses her small head. She’s perfect. “I’ll...come visit more, I promise.”

His mother sweeps aside his curtain of red hair and kisses his forehead. “Alright, dear. I love you.”

He closes his eyes. “You, too.”

* * *

The rest of the party is surprisingly uneventful. 

They receive a few gifts, which Audrey takes with a smile: a set of baby Quidditch jumpers from Charlie, a floating cradle from Ron and Hermione (“It’s a lifesaver, Perce,” Ron assures him. “Puts the baby right to sleep.”), and an array of self-warming baby bottles from Molly and Arthur. “They’re break-resistant,” Dad says proudly. “Charmed ‘em myself.” Even Teddy, who’s only seven, donates a color-changing stuffed hippogriff to Lucy. “It’s mine,” he says, “but I’m bigger now and I don’t need it anymore! Here!” He pushes it into Lucy’s little pink hand, but she’s still working on her motor skills, so it falls into Percy’s lap.

Harry gives his son a proud smile, and Teddy runs back to him and hugs his leg. Teddy was really young when his grandmother died, so he doesn’t remember losing her or his parents, thank Merlin. Harry and Ginny, even before they got married, were his parents.

George drinks a little too much gigglewater, so he and his family take off early. They’re soon followed by Fleur and Bill, who’ve clearly had enough of the commotion, and they pack their three children into a car and go, too.

One by one, the guests leave until the only ones left are Percy’s family and his parents. Audrey’s parents still live in Bangladesh, so they’re not there, but Molly and Arthur Weasley have never had any trouble treating other people’s children like their own. Harry lived with them practically every summer, and Charlie’s friend Hestia Jones lived with them when her parents were killed… There’ve always been a few extra mouths to feed around the Weasley’s dinner table. Even Oliver Wood stayed for a few months when his parents kicked him out. There’s something about the Weasley family that seems to draw in children from every walk of life.

There’s a knocking on the door, a sound that strikes Percy like a knell, and he hands the baby off to his mum before shuffling to the front to answer it. Could be one of his siblings returning for a lost toy or something. But when he throws open the door he finds not a redhead but a black man with a pink knitted hat trapping a mass of short dreads and a stubbled face.

He looks older. Softer. Like a worn sweater. 

“Heya, Perce,” he says, with a half-smile. 

A rush of cold rolls into the room. He’s framed by an evening sky and blended with a winter breeze. He’s different: his hair carries snow, not ash; his nose is pink, not bloody; his jaw’s whiskered, not bruised.

“Oliver?” Percy breathes, and he feels almost faint. He hasn’t seen him since… since...

* * *

_ Percy spots him from the bottom of the stairs, and his heart swirls inside of him. _

_ He runs.  _

_ There’s a woman fighting him, and they’re firing spells back and forth. “Oliver!” he shouts, and it’s more like a scream, more like a plea, more like a… _

_ It doesn’t matter, because Oliver hears him. Taking out the witch, he pivots in Percy’s direction and fires a red-hot spell from his wand. Ducking, the spell whizzes above his head and slams with a  _ crack  _ into something behind him; when he looks he realizes it was a masked man, now tumbling down the cracked stairs. Oliver just saved his life. _

_ He keeps running. _

_ Oliver does, too. _

_ There’s two rows of stairs between them, and Oliver’s skipping steps to reach him. Percy’s stumbling up the stairs, too, half-crawling. There’s blood running from a cut on his head, warm and sticky, right into his eyes, but he can hardly feel it. He hasn’t seen Oliver in so long, not since he joined the Ministry and betrayed everyone, and it’s that dazzling veneration in his eyes that keeps Percy moving. The prospect of forgiveness from the one person that matters is the only thing that lights his heart on fire— _

_ It happens too fast. _

_ He’s only a few steps away when Oliver’s foot slips on fractured sandstone. On instinct, he grabs for the railing—his hand closes on empty air. The railing’s  _ gone _. It must’ve been crushed in battle, because there’s nothing there to save him. His body follows; his arms flail for something to hold on to. Percy’s heart flips. He’s too far to keep Oliver from falling, so he dives, landing hard on his ribcage just as Oliver goes over the edge. _

_ His fingers close on Oliver’s brown wrist, first one hand and then the other, and then the weight of Oliver’s body comes down on his arm and he screams through his teeth with the effort of keeping him up. There’s three stories down from these bloody stairs, and Percy can’t do the math right now but he knows if Oliver hits the floor from this height he could easily die. _

_ They hang, suspended in oblivion. _

_ The moment stretches like putty, forever and forever and forever. He’s stretched out horizontally over the stairs, his lanky arms just long enough to hold Oliver’s wrist as he dangles a couple of feet down.  _

_ Percy won’t let him die. Surely, his arm will tear from his body before he lets go. “Oliver,” he chokes out.  _

_ He sticks one foot in a cracked stone to try to pin himself in place, to extend this moment, but his arms are on fire. He’s got two hands tight around Oliver’s wrist, and this bloody fool’s smiling. “Heya, Perce,” he says, as though they’re lying on the dormitory floor instead of brushing against death. “Didn’t think you were coming.” _

_ Percy’s using every muscle in his body to try to pull him up, but it’s useless. Hours of duelling and being thrown into walls has left his body shaking with fatigue. He’s not strong enough. “I’ll always… come back for you.” The battle roars behind them, and there’s a dip in the noise, something long enough for Percy to say, “I’m sorry I was such an idiot… I didn’t know…” Every word takes so much out of him, and he’s trying so hard to keep Oliver from falling, so fucking hard— _

_ “I know,” Oliver says, still dangling over the edge. He’s got Percy’s wrist, and Percy’s got his, and somehow they’re still holding on to each other. There’s sweat running down his forehead and blood spilling out of his nose and ash smeared across his face, but he’s still Oliver. His Oliver. “It’s okay.” _

_ He can’t let go. _

_ He won’t. _

_ Percy’s arm sticks over the edge, so he can hear the explosions and the shrieks of agony, and the terror at losing Oliver seems to shake him. Before he knows it, there are tears sliding down his face—tears that match Oliver’s. There’s no way he can save him. Percy’s wand is on the other end of the stairs, dropped when he lunged for Oliver, and Oliver’s wand is somewhere at the first floor, having fallen from his hand when he tripped. “D-don’t let go, okay? I’ll fix this—I’ll fucking—” A sob traps his words in his throat. “I’m  _ sorry.”

_ Oliver’s tears leave lines down his ash-streaked cheeks. His smile goes away. “Perce—” he starts. _

_ The crack splinters; Percy’s foot slips on nothing. With a distressed cry, he releases one hand as he starts to slide forward and catches the remnants of the broken railing with his arm, latching around it with his elbow as the rest of his body swings over the edge of the staircase. The second time Oliver’s weight drops, his shoulder wrenches from its socket—his arm howls in pain, and he has to actively stop himself from passing out from the sheer shock of it. Blood runs down his bare arm; his hand shakes so hard that Oliver’s wrist slides out of his grip. “I—I can’t—can’t—” _

_ Percy can’t fucking hold on. _

_ He screams in anger—in grief—in wretched torment—at the injustice of it all. The world caves in; all he can see is Oliver. He wants to scream forever. _

_ The fear is clear now on his face, his mouth slack and his eyes wide. “Don’t—” _

_ His hand slips. _

_ The world stills. Nothing else seems to matter except Oliver’s face as he falls. _

* * *

Mum squeals when she sees him; Dad smiles wide; Audrey grabs Percy’s hand and squeezes. “Oliver!” Mum cries. “What a lovely surprise! It’s been—”

“—years, yeah, I know, it’s good to see you, too, Mrs. Weasley.” Oliver’s got a cane, which is the first thing that Percy notices. He puts most of his weight on it as he walks forward for a hug from each parent. “Mr. Weasley.” He turns to Percy; he doesn’t say his name.

The blood’s drained from his face. “I didn’t...erm, know you were…” Percy’s lost all ability to speak, and he can feel Audrey staring him down. “I… I think I need to…” He feels faint.

“Yeah, sit down, Percy,” says his dad, pushing him to the nearest chair. “You’re looking ghastly, son.” 

He sits.

It’s not like he didn’t know Oliver was alive. After the War and everything else died down, Percy just...didn’t go looking for him. He got updates from some of his other friends, telling him when Oliver got out of the hospital, when he found a place to live, when he’d met someone new… He hadn’t ever seen him, not since the battle itself. He couldn’t bear to face him.

“Didn’t mean to spring on you like this,” Oliver says, almost sheepish. “Your mum invited me. I thought you knew...”

When he looks at her, Mum blushes and shrugs. “Angelina told me he was in town—I had to invite him, Percy. He’s family...”

Percy knows that better than anyone, but he can’t help himself from prickling at the invasion. He hasn’t seen Oliver in years—almost seven years, now—and he didn’t expect it to be like this: with his parents and Audrey staring over his shoulder while Oliver fucking Wood stands in front of him like the cover of Witch Weekly, eyes set on him. He’s dressed in a sage green, roll-neck sweater and raw denim, wide jeans; Percy’s wearing a plain collared shirt and some corduroys. He wanted it to be perfect. He’d planned this moment so many times in his head, but nothing like this. He wanted it private—somewhere he could apologize and fall to his knees and beg for his forgiveness. 

Can he still beg for forgiveness, after everything he’s done?

His parents get the hint—there’s something far beyond basic friendship going on here. The moment, to them, suddenly feels too intimate to intrude on. They make an excuse about being tired, put baby Lucy to bed, and Apparate home. To Audrey, however, it’s different. She folds her arms. “You must be Mrs. Weasley,” Oliver says, sticking out his hand. “Nice to meet you.”

She stares him down. At six-foot-four, both Percy and Audrey tower over Oliver’s six feet, but the former Quidditch player doesn’t waver. “It’s Officer,” his wife says.

“Ah,” he says, a little surprised. “Magical Law Enforcement?”

Audrey keeps glaring. It’s her own version of glaring, hidden behind a smile and dark eyeshadow, but Percy knows it well.

Trying to diffuse the thickening tension, Percy takes her hand from where he’s sitting and rubs her knuckles. “Yeah, she’s real good at her job,” says Percy. “She’s taken out so many Voldemort enthusiasts that they even gave her an award.” Flattery usually works in calming her down.

“Taken out,” Oliver echoes. “Nice.” His voice isn’t nearly convincing enough to satisfy his wife.

Audrey pulls her hand out of Percy’s. “Something wrong, Oliver?”

He shrugs, both hands in his pockets now, his forearm leaning against his maple-wood cane. “Nothing—just think there are better ways to stop that kind of...disorder. The old system worked.”

“The old system let Voldemort rise to power,” Audrey says. She’s clearly getting pissed. “The MLE has kept any new supremacist organizations from forming—”

“—and…” Oliver interrupts, and Percy presses his teeth together. Audrey doesn’t take well to being interrupted. “...has had major casualties of innocents every year since it launched.”

Magical Law Enforcement has become the most politically heated topic in the Wizarding world in the past few years. They evolved in the aftermath of the War as an aggressive force used to hunt down Death Eaters and their allies—a way of protecting the innocent and punishing the guilty. They were peacekeepers and guardians, and in the immediate wake of the War, they were a relief. 

Now, their job mainly consists of maintaining order—using force to crack down on blood status-based violence, pureblood supremacists, and Death Eater sympathisers. However, their techniques and their targets could sometimes be cause for protest. Just last week, anti-MLE protesters stormed the Ministry. 

_ Can you believe that?  _ Audrey said when she saw it in the Daily Prophet.  _ It’s fucking ungrateful. Half of them are probably Voldemort sympathisers anyway.  _ Percy doesn’t always agree with Magical Law Enforcement (if it were up to him, honestly, he’d probably disband them and go back to the old system), but he supports his wife. He knows she’s doing the right thing––making the Wizarding world a safer place.

“It’s a difficult job,” she says, and Percy moves to his feet, grabbing her hand again. She’s getting agitated. “We lose people. It happens.”

“Baby—” Percy tries, moving between them.

“It’s a  _ difficult  _ job,” she repeats, sweeter, harder, “and I don’t need some civilian telling me the ramifications of a job they couldn’t do even if they tried.”

Sighing, Oliver raises his hands in mock surrender. “Look—I’m not here to argue politics; I came to see Percy. It was really nice to meet you, really, but I just wanna borrow your husband for a few minutes, yeah, Officer?” He’s still looking at Percy like he’s just seen dry land after years at sea. 

“Actually… The party’s over, Oliver. It’s been so nice having you, but maybe you’d like to come back another time.” Audrey starts cleaning up, stacking half-eaten plates and lip-stick stained glasses. “It’s getting late…”

Percy rubs the knuckles of her hand, running his hand up her arm and then down again. “Please, Audrey? Just—just a few minutes. I’ll clean up everything, I promise.” Nervous, he smiles; he’ll pay for that remark later, so he kisses her to soften her pique a little.

She kisses him back, hand gentle on the back of his neck, and smiles a little at him. “Alright, baby. Just… don’t be too long.” She presses her lips against his cheek. “I love you.”

“Love you, too.” His heart sings in his chest with relief.

Then they’re alone.

Audrey’s upstairs, Molly’s in bed, and Lucy’s asleep in the nursery. Percy has a baby monitor hooked to his belt—a hand-mirror charmed to alert him to any irregular change in his daughters. He hopes his wife doesn’t go into either of their rooms. She’s having a bad day, and she’s not as good with Lucy on her bad days. But for now, everyone’s fine. 

Oliver’s closer to him now, barely a foot away, so he realizes with a pang of grief that he hasn’t actually touched him yet. This still feels like a dream—or maybe a nightmare—in its turmoil. Oliver must hate him (if he were Oliver, he’d hate him, too) for what he did: turning on his classmates, becoming complicit in You-Know-Who’s schemes, letting Oliver fall… What will he do to him? What does he want from him? 

“Perce?”

Percy tries to draw himself back to the present. He wants to say something, but his body simply won’t let him. His stomach churns with dread; his legs tremble with anticipation. He’s no longer looking at Oliver, for to face the man he hurt so much would surely make him crumple then and there. It was easier with the rest of the party present, as he could fall into that easy, formal rhythm, but with just Oliver here, everything feels so much heavier. 

Fuck, Merlin, let it be over quickly.

“Hey… You’re shaking.”

He looks down at his hands, which are trying and failing to remain steady. “I…” There’s a stone lodged in his throat. 

Oliver’s closer still. “C’mon, let’s sit down. Guess I shoulda given you a heads up, yeah? Didn’t mean to scare you like this.” Ghosting one hand on the small of Percy’s back, he guides him to a chair that he collapses into, still shaking. “Hey… Hey.”

Merlin’s fucking balls, he’s acting like a first year. Percy’s doing his best not to hyperventilate, but it’s hard. “S-sorry,” he manages, and he looks at him. 

Oliver sits in a chair in front of him (when did he have the time to move it there?), cane propped against the table. “Don’t worry about it—I shoulda told you I was coming. Merlin knows you’ve never been good with surprises. Let’s take some deep breaths, okay? With me, come on, in and out.” Somehow, even after seven years, Oliver Wood still knows how to calm him down.

They do it together, inhaling and exhaling, until finally Percy gathers himself and finds that Oliver’s hand is on his. “Thanks,” he says, and he pulls his hand away and into his lap. 

Oliver nods. “Honestly—I didn’t mean to do this to you, Perce. I thought it’d be…”

Percy almost says  _ different _ , but he doesn’t want to interrupt him.

“...easier.” He takes off his knitted cap and puts it on the table, shuffling his hand through his dreads. He’s bloody  _ old _ , Percy realizes with a weird twist in his gut. So is he, he supposes. They’re both twenty-nine now. The last time he saw him was seven years ago, bright-faced and full of determination. Now, he’s...gentler, his movements practiced, his eyes duller. His hair is even a little lighter, bleached at the ends, dreaded. 

Percy knows he’s not exactly what Oliver expected; Mum makes comments about his changing appearance all the time. He’s got grey hairs threading through his red hair (now longer), and he’s paler. He doesn’t leave the house as much as he used to, especially since Audrey told him to take a lower position at the Quibbler.  _ You spend too much time with Lovegood,  _ she told him.  _ I don’t want her in my house.  _ He didn’t argue with her; she already knew Luna was his boss and there was nothing going on, but to give her peace of mind, he did it anyway. Now he’s a mere columnist who works from home. He’s thinner, weaker, and always tired. The bags under his eyes are practically permanent. Ron said he should see a Mind-Healer about it; that was the one time Percy’s yelled at him since the battle of Hogwarts. 

He can’t look at him. Meeting his eyes would kill him. “The cane…” he starts, quiet. “That’s ‘cause of me, right?” He clenches his fingers to try to stop their trembling.

To his surprise, Oliver smiles. That stupid, bloody, foolish smile. “Perce,” he says. He tilts his head. “You think I’m...what, mad about what happened?”

He doesn’t know what to think. 

“You saved my bloody life, Perce. How could I be mad?”

Percy shakes his head. “I  _ left _ you.”

“And then you came back.”

“I dropped you.”

“And then you pulled me from the rubble.”

Percy’s head whines with pain, so he rubs at it to try to ease it. “N-no, that’s not—” He shuts his mouth before he says something stupid. He pins all of his thoughts inside, trapping them in his chest. “I’m just sorry about everything, okay? I… I’m sorry for everything I did to you.”

Now Oliver’s shaking his head, but he’s doing it in disbelief, still smiling. “It doesn’t matter, Perce—none of it matters. That was years ago. I’m doing great. Me and my cane here” —he gestures to it as though it’s an old friend—”have been acquainted for a long time. The war, everything… That’s in the past.”

He says it like it’s easy. For Percy, the war never left. It’s always there, pressing against the front of his skull, injecting every thought with darkness. “The past,” Percy echoes, and he swallows. 

“Yeah.” Another smile. “I just came here because I… I miss you. I haven’t seen you in years. I wanna catch up, hear how you’ve been… When I heard about your little girl—well,  _ girls,  _ I s’pose—and Molly reached out to me, I figured it was about time. I’ve wanted to hear from you since the battle, I just—” He shrugs. “Didn’t think you really wanted to hear from me.”

There’s this twisted wire coiled around Percy’s heart, and it loosens. 

“I honestly haven’t been a major part of the Wizarding world since...since I recovered, honestly, so I wasn’t in contact with anyone who knew you. Didn’t know you were married, let alone with kids.” He nudges Percy’s foot with his own. “I’m happy for you, Perce. You’ve really made a life for yourself.”

His face warms. “Yeah, I, er… I talk to Angelina every once in a while—you know, ‘cause she’s with George and everything, and she kept me updated about you until you left the Wizarding world. Especially after your…” He looks helplessly to Oliver’s cane; his voice grows quiet. “Is that why you left?”

“Yeah,” he sighs. “Quidditch was my whole life, just like joining the Ministry was yours. I couldn’t play, not after the fall, and” —he holds up his hand before Percy can say something— “I don’t blame you for it, Perce. I’m just explaining. The fall really messed up my spine. Couldn’t walk for five months. It took a lot of experimental Healing and physical therapy before I could even get back on my feet.”

“I’m sor—”

“Don’t be,” he assures him. “If it weren’t for you, I would’ve bled out under a bunch of rocks.” He sighs, continuing. “But I couldn’t play Quidditch anymore, so I left. I moved to London and worked with Muggle veterans, helping them adjust to life. It helped me understand a lot about myself, and I’ve been doing it till a year ago, when Angelina convinced me to come back and I met my boyfriend.”

Percy’s chest hurts. “Your...boyfriend?”

Oliver scratches are the back of his neck. “Yeah… His name’s William—a Muggle, no one you’d know.”

“Oh.”  _ William _ . “What’s he like?”

His friend shrugs. “Er… He's sweet, I s’pose. A psychiatrist—Muggle Mind-Healer, basically. He’s got a Muggleborn sister, so he knows all about wizards and shit. Makes it a whole lot easier for me, yeah? Moved in a few months ago, and we’ve got a cat now. Pumpkin.” Oliver’s picking at his fingernails, a bad habit he developed some time second year and never quite shook. Although he may look composed from the outside, his hands always give him away. “That’s how my life is, anyway. A lot’s changed since the battle. I thought I’d be a Keeper for a professional team by now, but instead I’m living with Muggles, no broom in sight.” He flexes his fingers. “What about you? Is your life going the way you planned?”

The question catches him off guard. If Oliver had asked him that question eight years ago, he’d have a different answer.  _ Yes,  _ he’d have said with a smirk.  _ Working for the Minister, away from my family… Life’s perfect.  _ Back then, that was all he wanted: to be better than them, to be apart from them, to be seen as superior to them.

Now, it makes him feel sick to his stomach. It was some warped sense of injustice, he feels, that made him think that way. All he wants now is to start over.

“I dunno,” he says eventually. Oliver watches him carefully. “I think I tossed any plans I had after the battle. Never made any new ones.”

“Well…” the other man starts. “Think you’d want to make some with me?”

Again, Percy swallows, and he hates how it makes him feel weak. “Why?”

“Why?” he echoes. “‘Cause I bloody miss you, Perce. Miss seeing you, miss having y’around. I finally feel like myself again, but I…” He shrugs. “I guess I realized I couldn’t be whole again without you in my life.”

Percy’s in a state of shock. “Oliver…” He’s speechless. Of all the ways he thought this conversation would go, this was not one of them. “I’m not…”

“Oh, shut up,” he says, before Percy can say anything else. “You were my best friend in the whole world. i never wanted you gone or anything. I just wanted you back.”

Percy still doesn’t understand. “I worked for fucking You-Know-Who,” he spits. “I abandoned you. I abandoned my family. I hurt people.”

“I’m not saying you weren’t stupid and naïve and a complete prat,” Oliver says. His head tilts slightly; his dreads sway. “‘Cause you were—weren’t we all? Merlin knows I would’ve turned a blind eye if it had gotten me onto a professional Quidditch team. We were young, Perce. We made mistakes.”

Percy scoffs, but the sound catches in his throat. “Not like I did. You should hate me for what I did.”

“What you did?” Oliver chuckles lightly. “You saved my  _ life _ .”

He ducks his head, staring pointedly at the floor. “Hardly.” 

A pause. “Perce.”

“Oliver.”

“ _ Perce. _ ”

He looks up at him. 

“I dunno what memories you have of what happened, but all I remember is you trying to save me, falling, and waking up to you trying again.” He pauses, trying to read Percy’s expression and failing. “And,” he continues, before Percy can spurn his words, “I dunno what happened after that—only what Madame Pomfrey told me. Your brothers came looking for you—found you lying half-dead where I was, and rescued us both. If it weren’t for you” —he shrugs— “I’d be dead.”

“But…”

Oliver shakes his head. “Get it through that thick skull of yours, Perce,” he says gently, and his hand rises. Percy shrinks back, but he merely touches the side of Percy’s face, gentle. “I could never hate you.”

Percy realizes with a start—it’s the first time he’s touched Percy since he arrived, and his skin feels almost electric. He reaches up and touches Oliver’s knuckles; they feel the same as they did seven years ago. His throat is tight. “You—” he manages, but his voice cracks.

Oliver leans forward and wraps his arms around him. 

Percy doesn’t move.

Oliver’s chin rests on his shoulder, and his hands move up and down over his back, trying to guide him into some sense of relaxation, but his muscles remain stiff. All he wants is to be sixteen again, melting into Oliver’s arms.  _ Heya, Perce,  _ Oliver said once, poking through the drawn curtains of his dormitory to spot his friend, laying in a fetal position under his duvet.  _ I made you some, er…  _ He lifted his lanky arms, where each hand held a mug of hot butterbeer dusted with cinnamon.

Percy shielded his head with his pillow, humiliated.  _ I failed, Oliver. _

_ I don’t think you— _

He lifted his head to glare at his friend, face red from rubbing away his tears.

_ Okay,  _ Oliver said as Percy covered his face again. He sat at the end of his bed, lifting one leg to anchor himself there, and set the mugs carefully on the floor.  _ So what if you did? It’s one grade, Perce. You ace every test—you’re bound to mess up. You’re only human, mate.  _ He sighed.  _ I know it feels hard now, but tomorrow will be better. _

Percy sniffled.

_ Come on now, your butterbeer’s getting cold. Sit up.  _

Reluctantly, he sat up, and Oliver moved over, close enough that Percy could spot the cinnamon still left on his mouth.  _ It’ll be okay, Perce.  _ He smiles.  _ Promise. _

Now, he lets out a shaky sigh.

“It’s okay,” Oliver says softly. “I’m sorry it took me so long...to come back to you.”

Percy hugs him back, gripping the back of his sage-green sweater and inhaling. “I missed you,” he chokes out, “so much.”

“I know.”

“All this time…” He can barely articulate his thoughts anymore. He’s lost in the smell of Oliver’s hair, in the sensation of his arms holding him steady. “All these years…”

He can practically feel Oliver Wood smile against his shoulder. “I know… Don’t worry, Perce. We’ve got all the time in the world.”

* * *

The conversation gets easier after that. They talk about anything and everything, although Oliver’s doing most of the talking.

It’s only when Percy hears floorboards creaking upstairs that he stops talking. “Oh, shit, shit, shit,” he says, getting up with shaky hands out of the chair and glancing at his watch. He was in the middle of talking about Molly’s obsession with Quidditch, but he forgets about it altogether. “Audrey’s gonna kill me.”

Mirroring him, Oliver stands as well. “Oh, yeah, I didn’t even see the time—here, I’ll help you clean—”

Percy shakes his head. He glances at the clock; it’s past one. “No, no, don’t worry about it. It’s probably better if you—”

He hears movement above his head: feet shifting over old hardwood.

Head shaking again, this time faster, Percy gestures vaguely to the door. “Yeah, I think it’s time—erm, for—for you to go.”

Why’s he so fucking nervous all of a sudden?

Using his cane, Oliver moves unevenly, making his way to the door at Percy’s behest. Percy follows him, hands shoved in his pockets. “Alright, alright. Well, I had a really good time, Perce. I, eh, I’d like to do it again someti—”

“Percy?”

His heart leaps into his throat. Audrey’s standing at the bottom of the stairs, hair messy, dressed in a tank and loose-fitting shorts. “Yeah,” he answers, quiet. “I’m sorry. He was just leaving.”

Oliver waves from the doorway, stupidly apologetic. “Sorry for waking you, Officer,” he says. His tone is wrong, almost joking, which is not what Audrey needs to hear right now. “I’ll be on my way.” He turns to Percy. “Let’s get together again, yeah? Maybe later this week?”

Noncommittally, he nods to his friend. He can feel Audrey out of the corner of his eye, watching. “Alright. I’ll see you later.”

He smiles; Percy’s heart sinks. “Yeah.”

Oliver Wood goes off into the snow and shuts the door behind him.

Audrey’s attention turns to him. “Let’s clean up.”

As he shuffles into the kitchen, he glances back, just once. He spots it lying there on the chair where Oliver was moments ago: a knitted beanie. 

Something warms inside of him.

* * *

_ Fred’s gone. _

_ Percy can’t take those last moments out of his head, can’t stop his brain from replaying that last picture of life fading from his brother’s eyes. He’s slumped against the wall, hundreds of feet away from his brother—his brother’s corpse, that empty husk—when he hears it. _

_ The sound is quiet, barely legible under the sobs of students and the cries of the wounded. Yet still Percy hears it like the shriek of a thestral, whistling through the rest of the noise. It sounds like pain, like blood, like... _

_ Something inside him  _ hurts  _ at the sound, and he has to find it. He peels himself away from the wall, leaving crusted bloodstains and imprints of sweat. He staggers over towards the sound with his good arm braced against the wall as the right one hangs limp.  _

_ Someone appears before him, a woman with white hair wearing a grimy apron—Madame Pomfrey, the matron he knows so well. “Mr. Weasley,” she starts, yet he can tell she has no idea which Weasley he is. “Oh, dear—let me look at you, your head—” _

_ He shoves past her.  _

_ The noise—that fucking noise—he’s heard it before. As he forces himself to keep going, stumbling over singed stone, he finally reaches the stairs, where there’s a pile of rubble and a dead body and the source of the sound. He lunges forward, climbing up the pile with one arm limp until he finally finds it. _

_ It’s Oliver. _

_ He’s barely conscious, and he’s buried under dust and debris and a girl’s bloodied corpse, but Percy would recognize him anywhere. “Oliver,” he says, with a gasp, like the war’s over. He turns to the hallway to scream: “Oh—help!  _ Help, somebody, please! _ ” The roar of battle swallows his voice. With one arm, he shoves aside the dead girl and claws at the debris, pulling it off of him, until a hand reaches up and grazes his wrist, like Oliver Wood’s still trying to hold on before falling. There’s a face poking out, too, barely visible, so he clears a space for him, removing rocks that were previously trapping him. “Perce,” he breathes, raspy and slurred. He looks like shit—swollen and bloody and coated in a thick layer of ash—but his eyes are sparkling.  _

_ “It’s me,” says Percy, finally freeing him from whatever was forcing him to make that sound in the back of his throat. Oliver gasps and coughs weakly. “I’ll get you out of here, Oliver—I promise. Help, somebody, help!” His voice dies in the fray; someone screams. His heart dips into his stomach as he realizes what he should’ve known all along: no one’s coming to help him.  _

_ He casts healing spells, everything he knows, but he doesn’t know enough. There’s already some spells clearly working on him; the corpse he pushes aside, which he now vaguely recognizes as a sixth year Slytherin he’d known, had clearly cast some advanced healing spells on him before she died on top of him. She was probably the only reason Oliver was still breathing, but also the reason no one had found him yet. _

_ Oliver barely seems to notice his attempts to save him. His ash-dusted skin is covered in bloody scrapes, but still he moves his head so that he can meet Percy’s eyes. Groggily, he smiles. “Perce,” he says again, like his name is a song, dragging the word out until his breath gives out into a wet cough. He blinks slowly, winces, and then closes his eyes again, his hand slipping away from Percy’s arm. _

_ “No!” Terrified, Percy grabs his arm with his good one and shakes. Oliver Wood’s eyes stay closed, although he frowns a little. “Wake up! Don’t do this, please, don’t fucking leave me, please—” He’s already lost a piece of his heart today, and he can’t bear to lose another. “Please, I’m sorry, please…”  _

_ His eyelids flutter, and he starts to say something, but it’s all slurred, fogged through the noise and probably head injury he’d gotten in the fall. As he stirs again, his hand searches for something, anything, and closes over nothing as Percy pulls rock after rock off of his legs. His legs look wrong, but Percy doesn’t have the time to shiver from the horror of it. He finally frees him, and Oliver’s feet stay limp.  _

_ “You…” Oliver starts, eyes glossy. “...came back.” He looks happy, deliriously so, like his whole world revolves around Percy. _

_ Percy can’t stop the tears from coming. The net of grief pulls at him, forcing him to brace himself above his friend’s body. Does he even remember what happened? At this point, he can’t tell, but he responds anyway, crying. “Yeah,” he chokes out. There’s a part of him that hopes he doesn’t remember the fall—Merlin, the terror he must’ve felt as he dropped hundreds of feet... “Always.” _

_ He puts his arm around Oliver and attempts to pull him up only to hear a horrible yelp of pain as the other man’s arms tense and push weakly at him. _

_ He’s stuck. _

_ “My…” Oliver starts, exhaustion making his eyelids flutter. His hand drops to his side, where there’s a dark, wet spot slowly spreading. _

_ Percy hadn’t noticed that before. _

_ There’s a partial piece of stone railing, ironically, sticking out the front of his shirt. It must have impaled him when he fell; that’s why no one has rescued him yet—why the rubble continued to bury him as he lay, helpless. It’s barely noticeable from the front—a bump nudging from his hip—but when Percy pulls up Oliver’s shirt to reveal the wound, it looks horrible. The skin around it has started to heal, clinging to the edge of the impalement.  _

_ It went straight through him. _

_ “No, no, no…” Percy gasps, his ragged breathing growing desperate. In his euphoria at finding Oliver, he hadn’t thought about the odds—a fall that far would leave him with fatal injuries even he couldn’t fix. “No, no, no, no, no…” He can’t seem to stop saying it. The tears come faster. “Help!” he screams again, but no one’s coming. Again, he tries the healing spells he knows, casting them over the wound, but they’re all superficial; he’s no Healer. “ _ Help me! _ ” _

_ It’s war. Everyone’s too busy dying. _

_ “Somebody, please—” he cries. “No, no, no…” _

_ One of his tears hits Oliver’s cheek. He smiles, his eyes dancing over Percy’s tear-stained cheeks. “You’re...crying,” he whispers, almost surprised, and he blinks slowly.  _

_ Percy shakes his head, crying harder. _

_ “...don’t.” Oliver’s words are coming out half-broken now. “Kiss me,” he says with a smile. His friend somehow gathers the strength to reach up and touch his neck. “Don’t...wanna...see you…cry…” _

_ He’s gonna say it again, but Percy can’t bear to hear his voice trail off into nothingness, so he does it, brushing back Oliver’s dirty curls and bracing one hand against the pile of rubble before leaning down. Maybe it’s the adrenaline or his own sheer stupidity or the thought of losing him or the sudden realization that his world explodes into a supernova of color whenever Oliver enters a room, but he does it.  _

_ It’s messy and salty and weak, yet somehow Percy doesn’t care. Oliver’s mouth tastes like blood and his just like remorse. This isn’t the way he wanted their first kiss to be (under the stars, he’d thought once, in the Astronomy Tower, bathed in moonlight and tranquility, drowning in his eyes), but he keeps going, crying, kissing sweetly and carefully and lovingly until he feels Oliver’s mouth turn up in a smile, and he pulls away. It’s a strange smile—filled with sallow melancholy and frayed pain. _

_ There’s a universe inside of Oliver Wood’s eyes. _

_ “Oh, Merlin,” he sobs. “I fucked up. I—I really fucked up, didn’t I?”  _

_ Oliver’s smiling again. His lips part; his chest expands as though drawing breath for a soliloquy. A bubble of blood pops between them, and only one word comes out: “Stay.” _

_ He does. _

* * *

The girls are asleep.

Percy and Audrey are in the kitchen, and Percy’s cleaning up while Audrey washes the dishes. The tension is palpable; he just wishes Oliver would have alerted him before arriving at his house. Audrey doesn’t like surprises. “The party was supposed to be over by nine,” she says, frowning.

“Yeah, I’m sorry,” he says immediately. It’s past twelve now. “I didn’t even know he was coming.”

She huffs in response. “Who is he?”

“Just an old friend from school.”

“That was a long conversation for someone who’s ‘just an old friend,’” she snaps. “How come I’ve never heard of him?”

Percy shrugs. Wrong answer, he knows, but even talking about him hurts.

Audrey huffs again. “Don’t give me that, Percy. I know everything about you, and you’ve never even talked about this ‘Oliver?’ Why didn’t you tell me about him?”

His chest is tight, practically rigid with tension. He can’t get the words out. “Sorry,” he manages.

“Sorry?” she echoes. “Sorry?”

A moment of overwrought silence stretches thin between them

She hits a dish against the sink, and he jumps at the sound, looking her way. “We’re  _ married _ , Percy, or did you forget?”

“No, I just—”

“You know what married people do? They  _ talk  _ to each other. They don’t keep fucking  _ secrets! _ ”

“Audrey, come on—it-it’s nothing, he’s just a friend from school, my—my old roommate—”

She scoffs. “I don’t ask much from you, do I? I’m the one working my arse off to give you” —she stabs in the air with her finger— “and our daughters a good life, and all you want is to fuck it up, yeah? That’s what you want? To lie to my fucking face?” Audrey’s waving her wand furiously, making the dishes wash faster. 

“That’s not fair—” he starts.

“Why won’t you  _ talk to me?” _

“I do,” he answers, and agitation rises in his chest. “I am! I didn’t know he was coming, I haven’t—haven’t talked to him in years, I swear, it was just—just—unexpected, baby, baby, come on, you know I’d never keep anything from you.”

“These days,” she says with a hard breath, “I have no fucking idea, do I?”

“Audrey—”

“You’re just so fucking  _ difficult _ .” Her hands squeeze over empty air, tightening into fists. He swallows. “Why can’t you be honest with me? We have two kids, for Merlin’s sake. We’re a family. We’re a fucking team—why do you always act like you’re not a part of it?”

There’s a feeling—sickening and terrible—constricting his heart, and he takes a step back. Percy feels disgusting. He knows there’s something wrong with him, something that separates him from the others, something that makes him feel like his whole life is inside out. “I’m sorry,” he says, but it’s not enough. “I’m just… I don’t know. Going through something. I don’t...know.”

It sounds stupid in his head and even stupider out loud, both of which Audrey can clearly tell. “What do you have to go through?” she says, and her expression goes red-orange. “What the fuck could you be going through, Percy, huh?” She’s right; she’s always right. “You wanna talk about going through—fucking—” A plate crashes in the sink and he jumps half a foot in the air. “I’m the one who gave birth, Percy, I’m the one who goes out into the city and tracks down fucking murderers! People who would kill me and you and our children if they had the chance!  _ I’m _ the one going through shit, not you!”

“I know,” he says, quieter. “I—”

“I’m the one who does  _ everything around here! _ ” 

Percy doesn’t see her wand move, but he feels the magic come for him and ducks before a bowl whizzes over his head and shatters against the wall behind him.

“I’m the one who’s going out there and fighting those psychos face-to-face, I’m the one who works and breastfeeds Lucy and hosts the parties and takes care of you when you’re fucking crying in a bathtub at two in the morning” —shame floods his chest and hardens into ice— “and you have the fucking audacity to look at me and say this bullshit? Go cry me a fucking  _ river!  _ It’s pathetic! What the fuck do you have to complain about?”

She’s startlingly loud, so much so that Percy glances upstairs to where his daughters sleep. “Audrey, please,” he starts, “you’re gonna wake the girls—”

“Oh, don’t do that,” she snaps, more agitated now. “I’m a good mother.”

“I know, I didn’t mean—”

“Fuck you!” Why the hell would he say that? Merlin, he’s so fucking stupid sometimes. She’s really sensitive about how people see her as a mother, he just had to— “You think I don’t know how to be a good mother? You think I don’t know how to take care of my own fucking kids?”

“Audrey,” he tries. “I never said that—I’d never—you know I think you’re a good mother.” He’s stammering, which just makes him sound more scared than he already is.

He forgets sometimes how utterly terrifying she can be.

She moves like a train, fast and unstoppable, storming towards him with a wand in hand, and his heart jumps into a frantic interlude. Percy’s back hits the wall and his legs wobble. He doesn’t even hear what she’s saying anymore—just tries to back out of his mind and into some kind of sanctuary as her wand pokes into his neck. “I’m sorry,” he hears himself say. His voice doesn’t sound like it belongs to him. 

Until she’s gone, he remains against the wall, hardly moving. Once she does (“Finish cleaning up. I’m going to bed.”), he stays until the sun peeks through their curtains and into the room, clearing tables and levitating shards of porcelain into the garbage.

It’s hard right now, but it’ll be better tomorrow.

* * *

Percy doesn’t notice it until he puts Lucy back in her crib. 

He was up for her early-morning feeding. After waking up to her cries, he bottle-fed her formula until she went back to sleep, and now she's out cold in his arms. 

Careful not to wake her, he moves at a snail’s pace. She’s made of glass. He brings the baby over to the crib and leans over it, gently placing her down in its center. Thankfully, she does not wake, but as he pulls his hands away, one of her hands grabs at his sleeve as if on instinct. He pulls his arm away slowly, and her sleepy hands let him go.

As he adjusts his sleeve, he sees it, a bluish ovoid mark at the place where his wrist meets his palm, hidden by the sleeve of his powder blue dress shirt. It’s not so much an oval, he determines, as it is a  _ thumb _ . As he turns his forearm over, he finds the faint remnants of four fingers on the other side. 

It doesn’t take him very long to figure it out. It’s a little startling, he guesses, to see her belligerence so blatantly on his skin, but it’s nothing that surprises him. 

Audrey’s used to handling people much more volatile than him—people who threaten her life and the lives of others—so it was hardly on purpose. 

And even if it was… That’s the way you have to treat him, he supposes. With a strong grip. 

Someone has to make sure he doesn’t do anything wrong, wrong like he did for so long in his life. The weight of his mistakes crush him every day—it’s Audrey that keeps him from making more. 


End file.
